Schallkrieg EP (Interruption by Request)

Scallkrieg - Ethos

I reviewed a demo, so production issues are always something to get out of the way first in this situation. The guitar is way, way, way too low in the mix here and the tone is mediocre. It's got that digital, crystalline sound that a lot of low-end, uber-cheesy power metal bands suffer from. I'm assuming that a full length release would result in that getting reworked and a much more organic, warm and meaty tone resulting.

As to the actual material - what are they bringing to the table, what works, and what doesn't? Well, they've got an interesting prog style here, clearly attempting to combine a diverse set of metal inspirations. The clean vocalist is clearly classically trained and his vocals really shine during the lighter moments, but I question whether he could truly hold his own as a pure metal vocalist. The harshes are solid, which was honestly something of a surprise since "second-fiddle" harsh vocalists are generally terrible in my experience.

The songs feature some very cool musical ideas, though often seem a bit disjointed when making some of the more extreme transitions and the trade-off solo sections are pretty sloppily put together. Still, its obvious that these guys have some talent and if the guitar were mixed better they'd have a couple of pretty damn good riffs on here.

Overall, a mixed bag from some obviously talented individuals who don't seem to have truly found their own cohesive identity just yet.